All the Big 12-2 Conference news that is and isn't fit to read...
And some other stuff.
Sorry, naysayers. The LHN will not keep us out of the PAC 12 or any other conference. [Forbes]
The provision goes on to say the parties have a “mutual desire” that LHN televise no less than two home football games per season. For this discussion, that essentially means nothing.
What does the rest mean? Basically, it means Texas is only contractually obligated to allow LHN to air the Annual Spring Football Game. Texas has to use “best efforts” to supply LHN with one home football game. Essentially, however, if they can’t…well, they can’t. No harm, no foul.
When luck is on your side, everything turns up roses. [Barking Carnival]
This morning is full of obituaries for Garrett Gilbert’s career, paeans to his class, and comments on what went wrong, all of which is married to the coronation of the kid from Belton. I would like to contribute a counter-factual that I think could have turned his entire career around and talk a little bit about the role of luck in football.
Barry Switzer on Texas.
The sheer stupidity of SEC fans continues to amaze me. [Track Em Tigers]
I understand why, but still it amazes me. The sheer stupidity of the "ME" mindset.
First the University of Texas(UT) sets up a windfall of profits and recruiting by getting the biggest piece of the BIG12 revenue pie, and it's own television network. A network ventured into with sports television conglomerate ESPN/ABC sports.
All of this to the chagrin of it's BIG12 partners, if they can indeed be called partners. Partners usually suggest an even amount of effort/money into the final product. Not always the case in business relationships, and yes, football, even college football is big business. Still, the idea that Texas somehow should get more revenue from the conference than any other member does sound like they only care about themselves, and not the rest of the conference members.
Yes, they are roomates. [ESPN Big 12 Blog]
Dumbest article of the day award goes to...Pete Thamel
But isn't Baylor still hanging around? We are just running out of people to bully. [NY Times]
The first would be to institute some type of equal revenue sharing, a notion Texas has shunned for years. Texas’ playing by its own rules ultimately led to the departure of Nebraska and the possible loss of Texas A&M from the Big 12. But now Texas is running out of colleges to bully, and the Pac-12’s interest in Oklahoma may not be very strong, especially because it must take Oklahoma State with it.
Do you know what happens when you think out loud? People think you are delusional. [I Am The 12th Man]
For the SEC fans who took offense when I said the SEC presidents and chancellors were stupid for insisting all Big 12 schools waive their right to take legal action before they would accept A&M's admission to the conference, consider this: The SEC has publicly exposed to everyone the conference's kryptonite. If the SEC is interested in expanding, and is looking at a school in another BCS conference, or another BCS school expresses interest in joining the SEC, all that other conference needs to do is threaten legal action, and the SEC will back off. How is this an intelligent move?
Hmmmm.....Not getting sued is an intelligent move.
Here's your weekend recap. [I Am The 12th Man]
The Aggie joke may be on SEC schools. [CNBC]
But adding A&M won't mean that CBS and ESPN will automatically have to pay more than the $825 million and the $2.25 billion they respectively agreed to pay for 15 years of rights. Why? Because there's already protections in its current contract.
It's called a composition of conference clause and it says that if the composition of the conference changes, the networks and the conference has to prove whether the change makes the conference TV rights more or less valuable.
Texas A&M adds some of Texas, but it does not deliver the state of Texas like the Longhorns do. And the SEC already has a lucrative championship game.
"Adding one or two teams does not cause the entire agreement to be renegotiated," said Neal Pilson, former CBS Sports president, who now consults on television deals.
Realignment
Former Kansas State AD Max Urich doesn't understand the Aggies' end game. [Topeka Capital-Journal]
The legal wrangling is really about the Sooners. [Topeka Capital-Journal]
But if there’s any hope — keeping Oklahoma, not Texas A&M, which is what the legal wrangling seems to be about — for the Big 12, then why not explore all avenues?
The Bears' behavior makes sense: They just want to survive. [Yahoo Sports]
More disorder in the conference. [Ft. Worth Star-Telegram]
There were only five games in the Big 12 this week. The way things are going, next year that might qualify as a full schedule.
Sue 'em, Bears!
If I'm Baylor coach Art Briles, I'm really hoping that lawsuit threat's a distant memory by the time my team visits Texas A&M in mid-October. Them's some angry Aggies down there right now.
Expect an explosion soon. [Ft. Worth Star-Telegram]
Tennessee athletic director Dave Hart told the Birmingham News this week that he anticipates a "massive explosion" of realignment if dominoes start falling. Hart said widespread realignment is "potentially coming quicker than people would have imagined" if A&M joins the SEC or if the Pac-12 expands.
Bedlam will remain unchanged. [Tulsa World]
Life in the Big East Conference. [Topeka Capital-Journal]
Jim Rome is not saying nice things about the Bears. [Dallas Morning News]
Jim Rome: Scrubby little Baylor. Even they have to know they're Baylor. Baylor going Baylor. Baylor, you do know you're Baylor, right? And that nobody gives a damn about you. That you're Baylor. Why would I be talking about Baylor? It's scrubby little Baylor that's holding up this potential seismic shift in college football. Texas A&M can't move because Baylor is threatening to sue them and the SEC. And they've enlisted the other scrubs of the Big 12 that are going to get screwed to join their cause.
How do you change the score after the game ends? [Los Angeles Times]
The chop block penalty simplified. [Cowboys Ride For Free]
This was written in 1929. Not much has changed. [Lincoln Journal Star]
"The recruiting of the American college athlete, be it active or passive, professional or nonprofessional, has reached proportions of nationwide commerce. In spite of the efforts of not a few teachers and principals who have comprehended its dangers, its effect on the character of the schoolboy has been profoundly deleterious. It's influence upon the nature and quality of American higher education has been no less noxious. The element that demoralizes is the subsidy, the monetary or material advantage that is used to attract the schoolboy athlete" — written by the Carnegie Foundation in 1929.
This writer is a boor. There is just no other explanation for this article. [CBS Sports]
And finally...
Our condolences go out to the Sooner Nation. You lost a great one. Lee Roy Selmon was a great athlete, but an even better person. [Sooner Sports]
BDR doesn't endorse any of the rubbish out there in the interwebs, we just link to it. For a lot more daily rubbish on a somewhat timely basis, follow me on Twitter.com/dimecoverage.